TEACHER EDUCATION IN THE EARLY YEARS: SIGNIFICANT LEARNING OF SCIENCES THROUGH CONCEPTUAL MAPS
Concept Maps; Meaningful Learning; Formation; Science teaching; Early Years.
This work is the result of the research carried out from a teacher / researcher concern, in face of the reality of Science Teaching in the Early Years of Elementary Education. Personal experience perceives it taught in a traditional and meaningless way due to lack of mastery on the part of teachers. Therefore, the objective was to investigate how Conceptual Maps can contribute to the improvement of Science Teaching and Learning in the Early Years. For this purpose, we base our research on Vygotsky's studies, on Joseph Novak's Concept Maps, the Theory of Meaningful Verbal Learning (TAVS), advocated by David Ausubel and Science Teaching from the perspective of Critical Historical Pedagogy. The work is classified as action research with participant observation, having as participating subjects 15 teachers from the 1st to the 5th year of a Public School in the Municipal Teaching Network of Teotônio Vilela - AL. Through a teacher training action, a pedagogical alternative was provided that contributes to the performance based on Meaningful Learning in the area of Natural Sciences. Thus, the question that guided the search was: Can Conceptual Maps contribute as a didactic-pedagogical tool in teacher education? For the collection and generation of data we use logbook records, focus group organization, application and analysis of questionnaires and offer of a workshop. We understand that the concept maps significantly influenced the learning of the Science contents presented by the teachers, in each of the five moments intentionally organized for collections and data generation in the classes of the participating classes. Being a tool that offers perspectives for significant advances in classroom practices, this tool serves as a subsidy for the advancement of investigations of teaching and learning processes. As an Educational Product, we developed a Pedagogical Strategies Notebook for Concept Maps in the Early Years of Elementary School.